Abstract
Overhunting typically increases during and after armed conflicts, and may lead to regional-scale defaunation. The mitigation of hunting impacts is complex because, among other reasons, several intrinsic and extrinsic motivations underpin the elevated deployment of hunting practices. Here we present the first study focusing on these motivations in a post-war zone. Following persistently heavy hunting pressure during the 27-year Angolan civil war, the offtake of small to medium-bodied species has increased recently as a result of large mammal depletion. However, prey choice associated with different motivations varied in terms of species trophic level and body size. While most residents hunted large-bodied species to maximize revenues from wildlife trade, many low-trophic level smaller species were harvested to meet local subsistence demands because they were more palatable and could be captured using artisanal traps near hunters' households. Mainly low-trophic level species were killed in retaliation for crop-raiding or livestock depredation. Considering all game species sampled in this study, 96% were captured to attend two or more motivations. In addition, hunting associated with different motivations was partitioned in terms of age and gender, with prey acquisition for the wildlife trade primarily carried out by adult men, while hunting to meet local subsistence needs and inhibit human-wildlife conflicts were carried out by adult men and women, children and even the elderly. In natural savannah areas lacking fish as a source of protein, a higher number of species was selected to supply both the meat trade and subsistence, while more species in forest areas were targeted for trade in animal body parts and conflict retaliation. Finally, local commerce in bushmeat and other body parts accrued higher domestic revenues compared to any alternative sources of direct and indirect income. However, these financial benefits were at best modest, largely unsustainable in terms of prey population collapses, and generated high long-term costs for the local to regional scale economy and native biodiversity.
Highlights
Hunting of wild terrestrial vertebrates, as one of the oldest activities pursued by both archaic and modern humans, has been undoubtedly critical in human ecology and evolution because hunting represents a form of defence against wild animals and procurement of food, clothing and therapeutic products [1,2,3]
In the early stage of the Angolan civil war, target mammal species harvested at the Quicama National Park region of Angola consisted primarily of medium- to large-bodied species
This was consistent with the set of game species sold in the markets in Luanda, which were commercially valuable as either bushmeat or other body parts
Summary
Hunting of wild terrestrial vertebrates, as one of the oldest activities pursued by both archaic and modern humans, has been undoubtedly critical in human ecology and evolution because hunting represents a form of defence against wild animals and procurement of food, clothing and therapeutic products [1,2,3]. Largebodied mammals are often the most frequently selected prey species for the bushmeat trade due to their larger meat yields and greater returns on energy invested in hunting [11,12], in addition to being more intrinsically detectable for game hunters in open landscapes [13,14]. These mammal species generally exhibit lower fecundity rates, larger home ranges and lower population densities, which result in higher vulnerability to population depletion and local extirpation [15,16,17]. Selective hunterinduced mortality can be markedly sex-biased in weakly dimorphic species depending on the hunter preferences and hunting regulations, if any [19,20]
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